QUEBEC — The work climate in the division of Quebec’s anti-corruption unit charged with verifying and accrediting the integrity of firms bidding for public contracts has improved, an independent report handed to the Quebec government Friday says.

But Robert Lafrenière, head of the unit, concedes more work can be done to improve the workplace atmosphere.

“Things have improved a lot and can always be improved,” Lafrenière told reporters shortly after the report was made public. “You know managing human resources is a daily affair. We have to be vigilant. There is still work to be done. We have the guidelines to attain our objectives, to settle these problems.”

In Quebec City to deliver a speech at a convention, Lafrenière was reacting to the release of two reports into the internal work climate at l’Unité permanente anticorruption (UPAC) produced at the request of Public Security Minister Martin Coiteux in December.

The reports — one detailing problems and the other solutions — reveals what many knew: cobbled together in a hurry in 2012 in reaction to stories about corruption in 2012, UPAC has experienced major organizational growing pains over the last six years.

Combine that with an ever-increasing workload — the number of cases being handled has gone from an average of 28 a month to 136 a month — and you had a recipe for the kind of administrative problems the reports reveal.

One factor in the increase is the fact that when UPAC started, the law stipulating integrity checks be done only covered contracts worth $40 million and up. In 2013 that was lowered to contracts of $1 million or more, sparking a backlog.

There were other problems. A lack of communication among employees who were on loan from various police forces and had little in common, vaguely defined procedures and poor planning resulted in frustration among the troops, some of whom went public in the media, creating the impression UPAC was dysfunctional.

“The creation of the Service de vérification de l’intégité des enterprises (SVIE) proved to be a challenge in itself,” Lafrenière says in an attached letter to Coiteux explaining the climate.

He noted the integrity unit was short of staff from the get-go, there was a high turnover rate as employees decided the work was not their cup of tea and, finally, no real performance evaluation system was in place.

UPAC has since set up a system of twice-monthly meetings where all employees are allowed to speak, Lafrenière told reporters. Analysts handling the accreditation requests have been given more freedom and clearer instructions are being given to “reduce the friction connected to overlapping functions.”

In his letter to Coiteux, Lafrenière states the investigation found no problems in the other big wing of UPAC: the one handling criminal investigations.

That statement was rapidly disputed by opposition Parti Québécois house leader Pascal Bérubé, who called in the media to talk about the existence of a second report that talks about major problems in that section of UPAC.

It was drafted by a civilian employee of the Sûreté du Québec, Karine Martel, in September 2016, but has never been released. On Friday, Lafrenière dodged questions on that report, saying he does not have the document because it is about officers under the SQ’s jurisdiction.

“It’s hard to know what’s been improved in UPAC when don’t know how it was in the past,” Bérubé said at a news conference.

And by the end of the day Friday there was fresh intrigue in the ongoing squabble between UPAC and the National Assembly over the parliamentary immunity of MNAs.

The Journal de Montréal this week reported that UPAC had requested meetings with two MNAs, Bérubé and the Coalition Avenir Québec’s Éric Caire – possibly in connection with UPAC’s arrest in October of Chomedey MNA Guy Ouellette.

UPAC cancelled the meetings at the last minute without explanation.

On Friday, Lafrenière told reporters UPAC had received a letter from the National Assembly mentioning the parliamentary immunity of MNAs.

But shortly after Lafrenière’s statement, the legislature released its own saying the letter in question is about another matter and UPAC is “using it” to justify the cancellation of the meetings.

The statement repeats the legislature has always cooperated with police investigations as long as they respect parliamentary principles of law.

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